


Zhar

by karasunotsubasa



Series: life and love, and zines [11]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Magic, Fluff, Human/Non-Human Relationship, Lonely Victor Nikiforov, M/M, Mating Rituals, Mystical Creatures, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Romantic Fluff, Short & Sweet, Wishes, phoenix!Yuuri Katsuki
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:15:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26176312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/karasunotsubasa/pseuds/karasunotsubasa
Summary: When you find a firebird's feather, it is rumoured you get to ask it to fulfill 3 of your wishes. Most choose riches and wealth, fame, talent, and other worldly possessions. It is too bad that Victor isn't interested in any of these. What he wants... Can a magical wish really give him life and love?As it happens, it can.
Relationships: Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov
Series: life and love, and zines [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1070673
Comments: 13
Kudos: 170





	Zhar

**Author's Note:**

> at long last I'm posting my piece for the [@onceuponayoi](https://onceuponayoi.tumblr.com/) fairytale zine, which I had the pleasure of being a part of last year. it's a truly magical zine, so if you haven't checked out the works created for it yet, you have a chance now 😉
> 
> this piece is inspired by two russian fairytales: Tsarevich Ivan, the Firebird and the Gray Wolf and The Tale of the Fisherman and the Fish, on which I put a little spin of my own. I hope you enjoy it! ❤️

Little Vitya is eight when he first sees him.

Flames dance over him, as if he’s clad in a mantle made from them. It is no cloak, though. Through his cloudy with tears eyes, Vitya sees the flames move as the man does. They hiss and crack as he dances – because that is what he’s doing. He steps here and back, twirls and bends, and waves his arms about himself; all of it in perfect harmony with music that Vitya doesn’t hear, but has no trouble imagining.

He’s beautiful. But more than that, he enthralls. 

Vitya finds himself frozen in awe, forgotten tears drying on his flushed cheeks.

It is hard to see the dancer’s features with the flames licking at him like playful sprites, but his eyes glow whenever Vitya catches a glimpse of them. Vitya’s breath falters every time, as if he could be entrapped in their depths and burned into a crisp.

He stands there, on the cusp of danger, peering through branches of a bush in his father’s garden. He’s afraid to move, but he wants to come closer. He wants to know who this man is, why the flames don’t hurt him.

Is he even real?

Vitya pinches himself, but the man is still there. His steps are as fluid as flowing water, which is a ridiculous comparison to make of someone playing with fire as expertly as the mysterious dancer does. 

Unable to stay away longer, Vitya moves. A twig snaps under his foot. The man startles like a doe. Faster than Vitya can blink, he twists towards him and catches his eyes for one fleeting moment. An expression of pure panic crosses over the fire that instantly burns harder as if to protect him. The desperate “Please, don’t go!” tickles on Vitya’s lips. Before he can speak though, a burst of fire so bright and hot it steals his breath pushes him off his feet.

Once he recovers, he scrambles into the clearing again, but by then… by then the man is gone.

All that is left of him are the scorch marks of his dancing feet on the green grass and a single flaming feather that Vitya carefully picks up. He’s scared it’ll burn him, but the flames that make the feather glow only tickle warmly against his skin. He cups the feather in his hands and doesn’t let go for years.

Long, long years, during which little Vitya becomes known to all as Victor Andreievich, the Lord of the Northern Quarter.

  
  


***

He learns the steps to the dance by heart and, frankly, by soul. Whenever he feels like crying, whenever life becomes too much, he returns to the garden and with his small feet he follows the much bigger imprints.

The movements he learns are similar, but they are not quite the same. The man moved too fast for little Vitya to match, and when Victor dances this same dance years later, he improvises on more than just the speed. His is a mixture of both: the stranger’s footwork and Victor’s imagination. The effect is like nothing anyone has ever seen. And Victor Andreievich believes that no one will ever see the likes of it, either.

He only dances for himself when no one demands his attention. This, the dancing, becomes such an inherent part of him that he thinks he’d be lost without it. Every time he takes the first steps, moves into position, waves his arms to the rhythm that exists solely in his heart, calm and warmth breathe through his veins.

He won’t say it’s love that he feels towards the man who showed him this way of feeling the breath of life in his lungs, but it is as close to it as Victor remembers ever feeling. He hopes… he _longs_ to see the mysterious dancer again. The fiery feather he’s found that fateful day Victor wears around his neck on a chain of gold that warms pleasantly from the fire that never ceases burning. It rests against his heart, keeping him honest and kind, and for that Victor wants to give his thanks. 

It takes years before he is awarded an opportunity to do that. Long, lonely years, during which he almost gives up hope. But then one night he falls asleep pressing the feather to his lips and whispering “Please…” against its soft flames and, come morning, he wakes up to a gust of warm wind from the balcony door.

“You have my feather,” says a voice that makes Victor jump awake. 

He twists in bed and… _there_.

 _He_ ’s there.

The man Victor remembers meeting only once, but who made a permanent spot for himself in his heart. 

“Where did you get it?”

“I found it,” Victor says, breathless with surprise and awe, and something else that he can’t name yet. 

Brown eyes narrow down on him. It’s only then that Victor notices that the man is no longer clad in flames. In appearance, he looks… human. Like Victor himself, albeit dressed.

“Are you lying to me?” 

Victor gasps. “I would never! No, please, I really found it. Years ago, I walked in on you dancing. I surprised you, I think, and you disappeared in a ball of fire. And this,” Victor lifts the feather hanging from the golden chain, “I found it on the ground. I promise, I didn’t steal it. You can have it back if you want it. Here.” 

Victor offers the man the necklace, but he shrinks back from it.

“I can’t,” he answers as if it pains him to admit. “You found it, so it belongs to you. At least for now.” He takes a deep breath, closes his eyes, and then pushes a hand through his hair as if making up his mind. “Tell me, what is it that you want with me?”

“What I… want?” Victor repeats, careful.

The man’s face is drawn. He looks ill at the very thought of speaking, but he opens his mouth and says: “Since you have my feather, you are entitled to three wishes. After those three have been fulfilled, I will reclaim the feather. So I ask again: _what is it you wish for?_ ”

“I–” Victor stops, too shocked by this revelation to even consider this fully. “I don’t want anything! I just… I just wanted to see you again to thank you. I saw you dance and then practiced what little I remembered. It helped me when I felt lonely or lost, so I simply… well… thank you.”

The man considers him for a moment. He says nothing, but he inclines his head the tiniest bit, while a spark sizzles off his shoulder and disappears into thin air. Victor’s eyes follow it, but they return to the man’s face in time to see his cheeks turn a little pinker.

“If you truly wish to thank me,” the man says at last, “use up your wishes and set me free.”

“Oh! Of course!” 

Victor jumps from the bed, but in his excitement, he has tangled himself in the sheets and now falls face first onto the floor. He groans as he picks himself up. All the pain from where he’s hit his chin on the stones disappears when he hears an amused release of breath above his head. It is not quite a laugh, but close enough to make Victor unable to hold back his grin.

It’s silly, he thinks. He’s embarrassed himself thoroughly, but it feels so good to have someone with him who does not treat him like he’s something untouchable.

“Can I have your name?” he asks what he’s been wondering about most during all these years.

“Is that your first wish?”

Victor tries to untangle himself from the sheets. “Yes. Is that enough?” 

“It’ll do,” the man answers, offering Victor a hand to rise up. 

Victor takes it, and the warmth of the man’s body seeps into him as if he was standing next to a roaring fireplace. Victor’s cheeks flush instantly, and the colour only deepens when the man catches his eye. 

“My name is Yuuri.”

“ _Yuuri_ ,” Victor repeats, sounding the name on his tongue. “Yuuri. It’s a lovely name.”

This time the blush spreads on Yuuri’s cheeks as well, and oh, Victor thinks, how silly they must look standing there together and blushing: both strangers, yet somehow closer than that too. 

“Thank you,” Yuuri murmurs. “Another wish?”

“I–” Victor pauses. “Can I, well, this is not a wish, but can I think about it?”

Yuuri nods. “Call me when you make up your mind, I will come.”

And before Victor can do anything, in a burst of fire that now only feels like a warm caress against Victor’s face, Yuuri is once again gone. Only the feather necklace is left in his wake, its flames sizzling happily. 

Well, that, and the softest flutter of Victor’s heart as new life hatches inside him.

  
  


***

  
  


It takes three days for him to settle on another wish. Once more he falls asleep with Yuuri’s feather pressed against his lips, yet this time when he awakens Yuuri is sitting in a chair by the fireplace. The nights are warm enough, it’s summer, but the fire is crackling at full strength. It must have been Yuuri who set the spark on the kindling. 

As Victor crosses the room in only a night shift and sits opposite Yuuri, he’s glad for the warmth of the flames. Both the ones in the fireplace and those that rest warmly against his heart when the feather necklace once again resonates with the dancing fire on Yuuri’s skin.

“You’ve decided?” Yuuri asks, turning his head to Victor. Unlike the first time they’ve met, he is smiling now, which makes him look sweeter. Kinder. Warmer. 

Victor can’t help but blush. “I have. I want to know more about you.”

Yuuri’s eyebrows draw in, a spark splitting where they meet and making them burn for a brief second. Then, his forehead clears.

“I will answer ten questions for your second wish, but you must ask them all within a week,” he replies. “Choose them well.”

“Then how about… Can you tell me where you’re from?”

“A land far away from here,” Yuuri answers, gazing into the fire. “No human can enter without the protection of one of my kind.”

“One of your kind? Who _are_ you really?” 

“You must have heard of us. In legends, we are often the harbingers of doom or those who give blessings to the worthy.” Burning bright, Yuuri’s eyes peer into Victor’s. “I am a phoenix. A firebird, I believe you’d call me in this land, no?”

This, this is more than Victor expected. He sits there, barely able to breathe. The air is warm, more with the strength of the flames that rise up the chimney at Yuuri’s confession than the summer air. Victor feels his throat dry. He swallows and it feels like he’s swallowing ashes. 

Still, that doesn’t hold him back from asking: “Why have you come here?”

Yuuri’s lips quirk. He looks away and the oppressive warmth dissipates. 

“I have always enjoyed the weather here. It’s colder, you see,” he explains. “Back home everything is full of light and warmth. It gets stifling. Here is different. You,” Yuuri looks to Victor again, “ _humans_ are different. You’re interesting.”

Yuuri is speaking in general terms, but the way he smiles at Victor… it makes something stir inside him. Something that has been long forgotten at the very bottom of his heart. Now, as if called by the warmth of the feather necklace, it rises to the surface in mellow, tender waves.

“But why my home?”

Yuuri lifts a hand to scratch his head. “Ah, that was just an accident. I enjoy the trees, the greenery. There is little of it where I come from. So when I spotted your garden it was too hard to resist. But you… you were only a hatchling back then, no?”

“A child,” Victor corrects. “But yes, I was. I still remember the way you danced. You were so beautiful.” Yuuri’s cheeks turn dark with a flush. His skin hisses like fire doused with rain. “But then again, you still are. No wonder, though – a firebird! Incredible!”

Flames sprout from Yuuri’s ears and neck. He’s flushed, blushing so hard that his skin covers in a warm glow of restless flame. He’s beautiful. He truly is. And as Victor watches him, he only grows more so. 

Before Victor can say anything more, Yuuri stands abruptly.

“Think on your questions and call me,” he says.

And in a burst of flustered fire, he disappears, leaving Victor warm to the very core, even though he is alone.

  
  


***

  
  


Over the next week, Yuuri comes to Victor every day, because Victor falls asleep with his lips whispering praises against Yuuri’s soft feather. Every morning he’s greeted by the sight of Yuuri’s glowing eyes, his warm presence warmer than the sun itself. 

At first, Yuuri keeps his distance. The more days pass, however, the closer he gets to Victor. Yet, still, whenever Victor smiles at him a certain way or gives open, unabashed praise, Yuuri erupts into flames in pure, delightful embarrassment.

He’s adorable like that and Victor finds him irresistible: in beauty and teasing, both. 

It is on the seventh day since their meeting, with only two questions left and a single wish more, that Victor wakes up to find Yuuri seated right next to him. A book from Victor’s shelf sits open in his lap. 

“Good morning,” Victor yawns, snuggling closer to his warmth. “What are you reading?”

“A bestiary,” Yuuri replies, then hums. “Are you trying to learn more about me?”

“Always.” Victor peers up at Yuuri with a darling smile. “Unless you promise me that you’ll keep coming back even after I return your feather?”

Yuuri says nothing to that, but his cheerful flames die down a little. Victor sombers up quickly as well. He sits up and the blankets fall off his chest, leaving it bare except for the feather gleaming golden against his skin. Yuuri’s eyes catch on it.

“You’ll disappear forever when I give it back, won’t you?” Victor asks. His heart squeezes painfully.

“You still have another wish to make,” Yuuri reminds him, but he is looking away. As if he doesn’t want to consider it either.

Victor bites his lip, then takes the feather in hand to give himself the courage to speak. 

“Say… can I wish for you to stay by my side and never leave?”

Yuuri’s shoulders tense. “Please, don’t. I don’t want to be bound. If… if you care for me at all, don’t force me into eternal servitude.”

“No, no, Yuuri. _Never_ ,” Victor quickly corrects. Yuuri turns his eyes to him, so vulnerable that Victor feels it tear the gates to his own heart wide open. “I just… I’m sorry, it might have been wrong of me to ask, but I simply wish to spend more time with you. Is there any way…?”

But he doesn’t dare finish. His fingers close around the feather. The flames licks at his skin, soft like a kiss. He can’t imagine living without it. Without Yuuri…

“I may be able to visit you,” Yuuri offers. Victor’s head snaps up with new hope. Yuuri’s cheeks flush and flames dance on his shoulders. “Not often! But if you… well, if you want, I could…”

“I’d love that, Yuuri,” Victor cuts in softly. “Whenever you can. For as long as you can. You’re always welcome here.”

Yuuri only nods, still flushed. With a lighter smile, Victor finally asks his last two questions:

“I was wondering from the start, but… do you have mates? This bestiary said firebirds mate for life, so it got me wondering if there is any truth to it.” Yuuri’s blush deepens and flames sprout all over him, hissing like an angry cat. It’s answer enough. “Oh, you do! That’s interesting. Let me ask this as my last question then: do you have a mate, Yuuri?”

“I don’t,” is all Yuuri says before he bursts into flames, and leaves Victor again.

But Victor doesn’t mind. His face hurts with the force of his smile, yet more than that, Victor’s heart swells, and swells till it’s full to bursting: with hope and affection and resolve to take the first step towards what he wants most –Yuuri himself.

  
  


***

  
  


“What is your last wish?”

Yuuri doesn’t shy away from Victor’s hand when he locks their fingers together and leads Yuuri to the garden where they first met. The scorch marks have long since disappeared. The grass has regrown. But the memory remains in Victor’s mind, fresh as ever.

“Can you dance for me?” Victor asks. He’s been longing for it since Yuuri showed up again.

Yuuri makes a complex face, torn with softness, but held back by uncertainty. In the end, he looks into Victor’s eyes. Long and intense are the few seconds during which Yuuri debates Victor’s wish, but it’s clear to see the moment he makes his decision.

Flames burst from his hands and back, and thus the dance begins.

Star-eyed, Victor traces Yuuri’s movements with his gaze. His heart swells, his throat clogs. This is what he’s been dreaming of for so long – this moment, now. 

And like he’s dreamed, while Yuuri is mid spin, Victor takes a step forward. His dance is different, but as they come together and then part to each side, they move within the same melody that makes Yuuri’s flames hiss and sizzle like they have on that first day little Vitya watched him from behind the bushes.

Surprise is golden in Yuuri’s eyes. “How do you–”

“I traced your footsteps,” Victor replies with a smile. They both twirl. Yuuri’s hand leaves a trail of fire before Victor’s eyes, but he bends under it, stepping to the side in one fluid motion. “And then I added some of my own. What do you think?”

Yuuri moves towards him. A step closer, then two back. And then, as if to surprise Victor as much as Victor surprised him, he takes three quick steps and takes Victor’s waist, twirling them into a spin full of heat and light and fire. Breathless, Victor allows himself to be lead by Yuuri’s warm hands. He gives into him and follows, step by step, twist by twist, every single move mirrored in perfect opposite. 

It’s only when Yuuri spins him away from himself that Victor realizes how dizzy he is, how hard his chest heaves, how heavy his heart feels with all the affection that has been steadily growing there for years –finally ready to burst into love like powerful fire.

Their hands part and the remaining warmth of Yuuri’s touch goes out.

They stand there for a brief moment, watching each other. 

“Yuuri, I–” 

As if all his energy was spent dancing, Yuuri says nothing. In a burst of fire he simply disappears and Victor, his heart pierced by sudden despair, falls to his knees. He grits his teeth, swallowing tears. He still had so much to say, so much to ask, but Yuuri is gone. And so is the feather from Victor’s chest. His heart, now bare, feels so cold that he shudders with it.

He looks to the ground, where the marks of their dance are still imprinted in the grass, the final memory of the man who stole his heart.

Suddenly, Victor gasps. 

There, on the scorched ground, rests a single fiery feather left by a firebird whose name and heart Victor now knows. He picks it up gently, carries it home, and when he lies down to sleep, he rests it on the pillow next to him.

“You could have warned me,” he says sulkily when warmth breathes against his face as Yuuri appears in his bed the morning after. 

“I would have, normally,” Yuuri says, tucking a strand of Victor’s hair behind his ear so that he can see Victor’s eyes. “But you surprised me so much I didn’t have any strength left.”

Victor leans into his touch. “At least you’re back now. Do I have to make three wishes again?”

“Not this time,” Yuuri tells him. Surprised, Victor looks up at him and is met with a smile that is both coy and sweet. “Did your books tell you how firebirds mate?” And when Victor gives a little “No,” Yuuri explains: “We dance for each other. And when the mating dance is accepted, we dance together. Does that remind you of anything?”

“Wait, wait!” Victor quickly sits up in bed. “So you mean that yesterday we–”

He falls silent when Yuuri smiles again, blush flaming on his cheeks. 

Barely able to believe it, Victor puts a hand on Yuuri’s heart. It thumps against his palm, a steady beat of life and love. The same as what runs through Victor’s own veins. 

“So we’re mated?”

“Not yet.”

Yuuri takes the feather from the pillow and brings out the feather necklace from his pocket. With his fingers, he melts the second feather into the gold, blows to cool it, and rests the chain where it belongs – around Victor’s neck, right on his heart.

“Now it is done.”

With a kiss, they seal their fate.

And thus, it is done. Victor’s heart accepts it gladly. The feathers, the warmth, and the man who brought them to him: his mate. His life and love, an eternal flame of them. Burning ever brighter.

For now and for ever. And a day longer still.

**Author's Note:**

> if you enjoyed this piece - thank you 🙏❤️ - and please remember to check out other zine pieces! there's so many lovely stories and arts to pick from!


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